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DIARY OF 1911

castle (down and up!). Through 5 gates, all
double and protected by Towers, one monolith,
into the outer-court. This in shape of narrow
ledge, running N. and S. gate to S. Builders of
this place not satisfied with 90 ft. wall and scarp,
absolutely perpendicular; but put a rock-moat
outside as well: moat once wide and deep; now
all stuff of the walls and a graveyard have filled it
up. The castle as a whole occupies the narrow
point of a peninsula, a rocky ridge, pointing due
N. and S. This is surrounded on the E. by the
Euphrates, on the W. by the little river Mezman
Su, and on the N. by the same: the S, end is
thus the only part not precipitous. The crest of
the ridge must be between 3 and 400 feet
high. This is at the S. end, the highest, but not
so high as the rock beyond the castle to N. and
S., from both of which it was overlooked, though
at a fair distance off. The walls on E. and W.
run about half-way up the ridge and from inside
them the rocks and ruins pile up, very steeply,
to the central pinnacles. The highest point of
all is very elaborately carved, and may have been
a palace, or a church. The local say a minaret,
which is probable, afterwards, but all the orna-
ment is not Arab, The building in the N.
corner of the ridge-crest is a mosque, with paved